TRENTON — The Trenton Freedom will have to wait eight months to get rid of the disgusting feeling they’re experiencing today.

Instead of getting ready to play for the Professional Indoor Football League championship in their inaugural season, the Freedom have to analyze what went wrong at Sun National Bank Arena Saturday night where they lost to the Lehigh Valley Steelhawks, 49-38, in the National Division playoff championship game.

Trenton’s season, as great as it became during a six-game win streak that took them to the division title, ended with three straight losses as Lehigh Valley became the first road team ever to win a PIFL playoff game. It came back from an early 17-0 deficit, shutout Trenton in the third quarter, and got a touchdown run and a TD pass from first-year quarterback Shane McSweeny, who used to play his high school football at nearby Bensalem (Pa.) High five years ago.

McSweeny became LV’s quarterback a month ago after Adam Bednarek was dropped as his hometown QB. McSweeny has thrown 20 touchdowns in those four games after hitting for 278 yards and four scores on 16-for-24 passing.

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Trenton QB Warren Smith did not have one of his best games — in fact it might have been his worst of his first year with Trenton. He was 24-for-41 for 289 yards and five touchdowns, and after McSweeny got LV up 11 he drove Trenton inside the 10 but had three passes overthrown in the end zone.

“They had our number tonight, and I didn’t play anywhere near like I wanted to,” said Smith, who finished with 2,890 yards and 51 touchdowns .

“There defensive line got after me, sacked me a few times (five) and had a half dozen balls batted down. Three were knocked out of his receivers hands.

“There four pass rushers are very good and have been bouncing back between Lehigh Valley and the AFL (Arena League). There a good defense and now they’ve got all their pieces back,” said Smith.

Still Trenton was not as sharp as you would have expected it to be in what basically was its biggest game of the season, with close to 1,000 fans watching.

“A lot of things are going right for us now,” said Lehigh Valley lineman J.B. Walton. “We came here feeling we were better than them even though they beat us here last time.

“Our receivers ran great routes to get open, and the quarterback (McSweeny has been great since he came to us. We’re doing the right things at the right time,” said Walton.

”This is three games in a row we’ve been shutout in a quarter. That shouldn’t happen,” said Trenton coach Kevin O’Hanlon. “I knew their new quarterback was good – he’s from my high school so I know about him, but we should have been able to move the ball better.

“We really beat ourselves tonight. Did you see Warren do anything like he had been doing this season. He just got beat up and our receivers did not get open. When Warren stepped up in the pocket he got hit. That hasn’t happened before.

“Lehigh Valley has been around four years and they have a heckuva secondary. They did nothing we didn’t expect,” said O’Hanlon. “And we didn’t do anything we expected we could do.”